RESEARCH: Cable still king of pay-TV
Market research firm Infonetics Research has released excerpts from its latest Pay-TV Services and Subscribers report, which forecasts and analyses the telco IPTV, cable video, and satellite video services markets.
“Cable video still makes up over half of the global pay-TV market, but revenue growth is decelerating due to a slowdown in new subscribers, especially in the lucrative North American market, as competition from satellite and IPTV operators intensifies and as OTT offerings from Netflix, Hulu, and others siphon away a small, but growing number of households,” notes Jeff Heynen, directing analyst for broadband access and video at Infonetics Research.
Highlights from the report include:
- The global pay-TV market, including cable, satellite, and telco IPTV video services, totalled $261 billion in 2011 and is forecast by Infonetics to grow to $371 billion by 2016
- The US is again the highest-value video market due to high ARPU, but Latin America and Asia are gaining ground as a result of expanding subscriber bases
- DirecTV and Comcast remain the global market leaders for pay-TV revenue and subscribers
- DirecTV enjoys the highest ARPU due to the high take rate of its value-added services and premium content such as the NFL Sunday Ticket
- Comcast is the global pay-TV subscriber leader, with over 22 million subscribers in 2011
- In 2011, the top 20 pay-TV revenue leaders accounted for 50 per cent of the revenue, while the top 20 subscriber leaders represented just 30 per cent of subscribers
